Handiwork
by Aownr1669
Summary: One-shot.  Daryl's offer to assist isn't altogether altruistic.  Rated M for implications.  Daryl X OC.


_A/N: About sandpaper. Y'all know what it is, I'm sure. The fewer zeros the rougher it is. Please read and review. _

**Handiwork**

If Daryl Dixon were sold in a hardware store, he'd be a variety-pack of 3-M sandpaper. Course shaping to fine finishing and everything in between. .0 to .000 grit. At least that's what he was beginning to feel like to me. Abrasive. Wearing down my will one layer at a time, like I was being finished by the skilled hands of a master craftsman, the calloused fingers of an expert.

When our small group joined theirs, it was a matter of life or death. Sounds dramatic, but it was a simple fact. We had the place, they had the know-how. Mutual back-scratching. That was six months ago. Life has become safer, more comfortable. Not _totally _without care, though. We still have to deal with walkers. We still worry about other survivors who may be aggressive or downright hostile. We still have to scavenge for food, supplies, equipment, fuel, weapons, everything we need. We're trying to grow as much food as we can but we have chickens, dear lord, _chickens_. Eggs. We find us a cow and a goat and we'll be a happy little group. With cheese. Yup, life would be sweet then. We're not there yet, but we're heading in the right direction.

Since the apocalypse (that's what I call it because, well, yeah, it was the end of the world as we know it and no, Michael Stipe, I did most certainly NOT feel fine, thank you), I had pretty much sworn off men totally. It wasn't that I didn't like men. On the contrary. Love 'em. It's just that, well, there are so many other things to worry about other than the whole boyfriend thing. Dating? Kind of a small pool of candidates. Casual hook-ups? Not when you see everyone day in and day out-talk about awkward. Long-term relationships? Really? When there's no guarantee of anything long-term anymore? No thanks.

Now, this swearing-off men wasn't easy. Far from it. Just because dead people are trying to eat you, doesn't mean you stop wanting to get laid. There were some potential candidates. Shane is hot, in a crazy I'll-kill-you-in-your-sleep-if-you-cross-me kind-of way. Glenn's cute, but really young and very innocent. It would have been too creepy. Rick is very married. I won't go there. Period. T-Dog is a nice guy, big and bear-ish, but kinda', oh I dunno'. We're _just _friends. Dirty-joke telling, beer after dinner, friends. Bryan is not even in the mix. He was part of our original group, real smart, but dorky and I knew he was a big coward. Not reliable in a crisis. When the going got tough, Bryan was the one cowering behind the counter. Dale's a sweetheart. Older and probably real, ahem, attentive, but he's more like everybody's Dad. Donnie's like that too. Older, more like a father-figure. But then there's Daryl. One of these things is not like the others. One of these things just doesn't belong.

Rude, hot, bad-tempered, uncommunicative Daryl. Aloof, lethal, wily, gorgeous Daryl. Sweaty, mysterious, sexy, almost-feral Daryl. He was more at home in the woods than in the compound. Half the time he spent his days out there and his nights in the out-buildings or on the porch. Watching. Like he's waiting for someone. Skulking. Lurking. Keeping to himself, mostly, on the edge of the rest of us. Keeping more than some of the rest of us on edge ourselves.

There was an undercurrent to Daryl. Like the smell of burning electrical wires. Barely perceptible. Ozone-y. A vague whiff of something not right but you could never quite tell where it's coming from so you search from room to room, sniffing. Then when it's too late, you realize your house is on fire. Daryl was the wayward spark behind the outlet in my little house. Quiet and unnoticed. At least, I didn't _think _he'd noticed that I had allowed myself to start smoldering.

I'd seen him looking from time to time, sure. Nothing obvious. Nothing too overt. A glance. A stare that lasted a millisecond longer than I would have thought it should have. But he'd never said anything. He barely speaks. I don't think he was happy with the decision to join the two groups. He was given the opportunity to leave but he didn't. I keep waiting for him to just not be there anymore. To go out on his own, leave without telling anybody, but he hasn't...yet.

"Damn it!" I hiss, feeling another light tickle underneath the fabric of my dirty tee shirt. Andrea and I had been in the woods all day, mushrooming and looking for anything else edible to supplement our diet. I twist and squirm on the stool I'm sitting on in the living room, trying to reach up under from behind, trying to shake out the little brown crawly pain in the ass. I pick it up off the floor as it drops out of my shirt and pinch it into the now-empty beer can.

A low voice behind me says "Tick."

I turn around slowly, surprised. I didn't know that he was behind me, let alone that close. I thought I was the only one in the living room. "Woods is thick with them." He is just standing there, looking at me with those blistering eyes. Fanning the flames. Jesus, what is he doing?

"Out there long?" he says.

"Uh-huh. Andrea and I. We've both pulled a ton of them off already."

"Better check good." he says quietly. He runs his fingers through his hair and then wipes the back of his hand across his lips. "Want me to?" he looks at me, lowering his chin, the corner of his upper lip sliding sideways almost imperceptibly.

Holy crap. Did he just offer to check me for ticks? Did I just _hear _that right? First thing he's said to me in days and I cannot hear above the shhhhh-shhhhhh sound his .0 grit is making as his blue eyes stare at me. I lose a thick layer of willpower to it's coarse grain, tiny particles of my common sense and control floating downward into a little pile of dust at the bottom of my brain. Not good, friction and wood dust. Combustible. He's not serious, he can't be serious. I decide to call his bluff.

"Sure." I say, slowly turning around. "Your place or mine?" I try to look at him, stone-faced, blinking slowly.

"Yours." He takes a step closer to the stool. "Right now." he says, his voice cool, unruffled. Oh. Dear. God.

I nod my head, not knowing what else to do. Surely he wasn't going to really go through with this. Or was he? I'd sworn off men, I reminded myself. Was I really taking a guy I barely knew up to my room on the pretense of checking for ticks? I was pretty sure he was almost...dangerous, at that. Jesus, you've really stepped in it, I thought. It wasn't like I didn't _want _anything to happen, I just, well, I wasn't prepared for it to happen like this. I thought it would be, maybe more romantic? Seriously, in this day and age. Carry me up the stairs like Scarlett? Please. Up against a tree in the woods was probably more how I figured it would happen, IF it was even going to happen.

I turn around and walk towards the stairs slowly, my mind racing. No way could I back down now. No way, but what the fuck am I going to do if I chicken out? I had started this. I realize that my feet are moving without my mind knowing it. We start up the small back stairs and he stays two steps behind. I can feel his eyes on me, burning the back of my shirt. I can hear his hands on the banister on each side as he pulls himself up the steps. A soft thump. Thump. Thump. Shit! Shit! Shit! What the fuck am I going to do?

My room is the one at the top of the stairs. It would have been a servant's quarters long ago when the house was first built. Low, sloped ceiling, small, close. One tiny window. Built for someone who wasn't going to spend a lot of time in it. Somebody who was going to take care of others more than themselves. Someone who didn't matter much. I wonder briefly if Darryl was going to even be able to stand up in it and then I wonder if Daryl is even planning to do much standing up. I turn the knob and lead us in, leaving the door open a bit. He walks over and closes it and then turns around slowly, eyeballing the room methodically, sweeping down on wall and up the other, across the ceiling and then down the floor.

His eyes land on the small four-poster and move then to the over-stuffed chair with the matching ottoman parked a couple feet away. He walks over and sits down, his boots hollow on the ancient wooden plank floor. He pulls the ottoman over in front of him. "Sit." he commands.

I sit down gingerly on the side, not knowing what he was going to do. I 'm sure he can see I'm shaking a tiny bit. He turns the padded stool a quarter turn sideways, the legs scraping on the floor, so that I am facing away from him.

"Hat?" the cool voice says from behind me.

"Yup."

"Check already?"

"Yeah."

"We'll see." he says. And then it starts. My long spiral downwards. The decline of my self-discipline and willpower. The heavenly hell that is Daryl Dixon. He's got the .00 out. Medium grit. Just perfect for smoothing out rough spots, testing the grain and seeing what needs to come off...and where. Not coarse, yet not ready for the finishing touch.

He puts his hands in my hair. I have never had any man do that before in my life. He starts at the top, at my hairline, moving backwards, slowly, methodically, feeling along my scalp, pulling his fingers downward, quarter-inch by quarter-inch, pulling locks apart. He works his way from front to back, pushing my head down as he goes, his fingers tangling, thumbs moving along my hairline behind my ears, down to the back. The way his hands move is beyond description, gentle, tender, carefully feeling my scalp for the tiniest bump. It is mind-numbing. Relaxing and exciting at the same time, like I could climb on top of him and drift off to sleep all at once. I am losing everything, slowly, smoothly.

He stops and I turn my head around slowly. "Hairbrush." he grunts. Such a scintillating conversationalist. Good thing, because I would have had a hard time formulating words for a reply. I rise and walk slowly to the small dresser, pulling the broad flat brush off the top, returning to hand it to him and sit back down, still half dazed.

Daryl separates my hair in half and pushes the right side over my shoulder. "Got too much hair." he says. He puts his hand on the back of my head and pushes gently forward as he runs the brush from the top to the ends, down the entire length, ending at my waist. Slowly, carefully, sensually. Long strokes straight down. Slower than need be. I count to myself. One thousand one, one thousand two, one thousand three, one thousand four. Deliberate. At the end of each stroke there is a pause.

He finishes with the one side and gathers it in his hand, moving it around to my left shoulder and gathers the hair he'd put over my right shoulder, gently pushing the back of my head above my neck with his fingertips. "Too damn much hair" he mutters. He starts in the same way as before. Hand on the back of my hair with just a bit of force as he pulls downward with the brush, pausing at the end of each stroke. Slowly again. One thousand one, one thousand two, one thousand three, one thousand four. My mind is thick, like trying to swim in caramel sauce. I raise my head to try to take in a breath to clear my head. I close my eyes at some point as he slowly pushes my head down towards my chest again.

He pulls both sides of my hair together in back and runs the brush down the middle a couple times. The brush ends at the fleshy part of my ass as it stretches my hair to its full uncurled length. It's like he's measuring it for something. Pulling it down as far as it will go and then letting the brush go just a bit further as moves beyond the ends. It is the absence of the long gentle strokes that cause me to snap back from my semi-conscious state. "All done?" I ask, my voice cracking.

"Nope." he says. The hairbrush comes sliding over my shoulder. I take it from him, my back still to him. "Take off your shirt."

"What?" I choke.

"Shirt."

"Dixon, you're not serious." I say, twisting around to face him. Mistake. He's leaning towards me, his steely blue eyes looking straight into mine. He doesn't blink either, not a twitch on that chiseled face. I am so close I could see his tanned skin and can make out the individual hairs in his scruffy goatee. I can see the circular brown mole on the outside corner of his upper lip. I can see the tiny beads of sweat above his eyebrows and without looking down, see his chest rise and fall slowly. I don't dare look away. He is mesmerizing, no emotion registering whatsoever, yet the blank look says so much. He knows I will do it. He just takes it for granted. No doubt at all.

Again with the sandpaper. Abrasion wearing me away. Another layer of my resolve gone, just the thickness of a hair. He's switched from .00 back to a rougher .0 grit. Not as smooth, intentionally removing more now. Roughly. He continues to stare at me, not saying a word. Breathing slowly, I realize I'm biting my lower lip.

"Crap." I roll my eyes and look away. I turn back around and pull up my t-shirt in back, just as far as my shoulder blades. I hear him clear his throat and I complete the maneuver, taking it completely up and over my head. His hands move my hair completely over one shoulder and here I sit on the edge of the ottoman, trying to hold my breath, my back completely exposed to his gaze. His fingers on my neck, back and forth, rough calloused hands moving over my skin, feeling every inch, every pass slightly lower, across the tops of my shoulders now, lower each time.

He lifts my arms up out to the side and moves his hands under my armpits, four fingers pressing against the contours, gliding from top to bottom of the concave hollow. He lowers my arms and runs his index fingers under my bra straps, moving down from the top of my shoulder to where they join the back. He then removes them only to put them under the band, moving outward towards my sides, his thumbs on top of the soft, worn elastic. He slows his movements as he gets to the sides, stopping just in front, even with my armpits and lingers a second, reversing direction and bringing them back to the back again before removing them altogether.

"Lean forward." he says quietly as he puts a hand flat on my spine, halfway down. Daryl runs a finger back and forth across a tiny bump on my back. "Hold still." I hear him reach into his pants pocket and a spark of worry goes off in the pit of my stomach. Pffffft.

"What? Tick?"

"Mmm." he grunts as I hear the telltale click and little explosive whoosh of a match being stuck, a whiff of sulfur in the air. My mind flashes on what he's doing, the recognition coming a millisecond before the puff of air and the smoky scent of burnt wood comes as he blows out the match. I don't have time to steel myself against the next step, but I know what is coming. Daryl holds the still-red match tip to the tick that had securely attached it's self to my back, causing it to withdraw. The match burns the tick but I can still feel the little jolt as he pushes against the tick's body, the heat spilling over the sides of the tick and burning my skin slightly as well.

"Shit." I hiss, trying not to move. Daryl's arm moves quickly around my waist, holding me tight to keep me from moving. "Get it off." I grab his arm with my hands like I'm holding on to monkey bars and about to flip over.

"Don't move." he says calmly. I can feel his hand on my back shift its position and his thumbnail against my skin, trying to pry up the now squirming tick, backpedaling to remove itself from my flesh. I can also feel the heat of his hand on my hip, my stomach tight against his solid inner arm. He brings his hand away from my back and drops something on the floor. "Been there awhile." he says, letting his arm around me slack a bit, bending my back away from him a bit further. .0 again. Another layer gone, not so subtly.

I can feel Daryl's breath on my back before I feel the heat and roughness of his lips. I hear my gasp out loud as he presses them to my back, surrounding the place where the tiny tick had been. My mind lurches as his arm around my stomach pulls me closer to him, steadying me. His lips are hot on my skin as he starts to gently. What, I ask myself. What is he doing? Oh my god. Don't moan. Don't you dare moan. I close my eyes as I feel the fingers on my hip open and close slightly. I can feel goose bumps start low on my back and I pray that he doesn't notice. He pulls gently with his lips parted slightly, maybe for twenty, thirty seconds. I feel him let go and move his lips as he runs his tongue around in a circle, then blows softly on the wet skin. I clamp my jaw shut and try to swallow as he untangles his arm from my waist. He's using a rasp now, not even bothering with sandpaper.

"Stand up."

"Nuh-huh." I can't make my voice anything above a whisper.

"Up." Daryl says gruffly.

I stand up slowly, my legs shaking. I can hear him standing up, pushing the ottoman sideways with his foot, sliding it halfway across the small room. He puts both hands on my back and runs them down slowly, fingers tracing the curves of my hips, stopping at the waist of my thin knit pants. He slips his fingers inside the elastic waistband and runs them slowly around to the front and then back to the sides. I fold my arms across my chest and lower my head, closing my eyes once more. His fingers are both rough and hot on my hips as he slowly pulls the pants carefully down, leaving me standing in front of him in my underwear. Exposed. Vulnerable.

Daryl runs his hands down the side of my hips slowly, carefully, fingers flat against my skin, down the sides of my thighs, past my knees and then back up, scraping off another layer as he goes. If he finishes what he's started, I will be like a pencil left too long in an electric sharpener. Ground down to nothing but shavings at the bottom of the little plastic bin.

His hands move over my ass slowly, the pads of his rough fingers catching lightly on the soft white cotton. He puts a finger and thumb on the elastic of the leg holes and runs them around the openings slowly, his other fingers trailing behind, grazing through the thin fabric. He doesn't stop when he gets to the sides, the backs of his fingers dragging on the flesh of my thighs as he runs around to the center, as far as he can go. I jerk the tiniest bit when he gets all the way around to the front and stops and I hear him huff a little bit of a chuckle under his breath. Still with the .0. He withdraws his hands and replaces them this time to the back of my thighs up at the fold where my butt joins my legs, running them sideways under my ass and then down straight to my knees, a long deliberate stroke with the sandpaper.

His scorching hands move to my waist and he turns me around roughly, still stone-faced. I don't know how he's doing it because I can feel the heat rising from my own cheeks and neck. I'm probably shimmering like an asphalt county road in August. At least I feel like one inside. Daryl, however, looks totally under control.

He lifts his hands and runs them along the bottom elastic of my bra, which is now becoming damp with sweat. I stare at the ceiling, unable to look at him. Out of the corner of my eyes, though, I can see the top of his head, is short, almost spiky brown hair. He's looking straight at me, my body, his hands moving slowly. He looks up to see if I'm watching and then returns to his work. He's now using the .000 to take off this layer. Slowly, painstakingly, making sure there was nothing left, smooth as glass, absolutely no willpower, nothing left with which to fight.

Daryl stops and clears his throat and I look down as he stands up. He is so close I can feel the heat coming off of him now, radiating outward. The cool was a lie. He's not cool at all. My eyes look slowly back up, past his thighs, his narrow waist, the muscles of his stomach tight under the sleeveless olive green tee-shirt, past his chest moving rhythmically as he breaths, to the scraggly goatee and then to his eyes. No more layers. They are deep, electric blue, half-lidded as he towers over me. Smoky and deep, like they belong in Yellowstone with all the other clear blue lakes that you desperately want to touch but can't because of the sheer scorching heat lying under the wispy haze that rises from them.

"You're clean." he says.

"Uhm...thanks." I reply, my knees still shaking.

I blink, trying to show no emotion, knowing that I'm failing miserably. This man has just put his hands on almost every part of my body and I let him. Without saying a word, I let him. Without so much as a protest...or the slightest inkling of what would happen afterwards. I let him because with every look, every touch, he stripped away layer after layer, of my resolve. .0 to .00 to .000. Stroke after stroke, from start to finish. Wearing me down.

He steps aside and walks to the door, pausing, his hand on the knob, and turns back toward me. I'm standing in the same spot, my mouth open, pants down around my ankles where he left them, still staring. If he blew a breath at me I'd scatter like dust, dancing in the afternoon light that spills in from the tiny round window behind the bed.

I look at him and I get it. My light bulb moment. "Ticks don't have venom. They withdraw, not inject." I say quietly, letting him know I know. The lips on the my back. That was just for him.

He grins slowly, his eyes twinkle. He raises his eyebrows quickly and his grin widens as he turns back and shuts the door behind him. I hear his boots in the hall and then on the stairs, their sounds becoming muffled as he walks further and further away. Pulling up my pants before I trip over them, I reach for my tee shirt on the chair and collapse, my legs finally giving way. I curl up and bury my face in its soft fabric, almost trying to hide from myself. Letting the cool air settle around the new, smoother me, I wonder how much more work he thinks he has yet to do until I'm finished.


End file.
